coleminor
Trap-Jaw
"Undefeated in mortal combat."
Posts: 431
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Post by coleminor on Mar 16, 2011 17:28:23 GMT -5
I have to agree on the comment of the documentary appearing infomercial like in nature. When you are getting it drilled into you what a transcendent event Wrestemania is ad nauseum, the sentiment gets diluted somewhat.
By far the highlight for me was the brief moment at IX where Bret Hart is enquiring where the girls are. Probably a moment taken dramatically out of context which for me made it all the more amusing.
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Cranjis McBasketball
Crow T. Robot
Knew what the hell that thing was supposed to be
Peace Love and Nothing But
Posts: 41,952
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Post by Cranjis McBasketball on Mar 16, 2011 17:31:31 GMT -5
I have to agree on the comment of the documentary appearing infomercial like in nature. When you are getting it drilled into you what a transcendent event Wrestemania is ad nauseum, the sentiment gets diluted somewhat. By far the highlight for me was the brief moment at IX where Bret Hart is enquiring where the girls are. Probably a moment taken dramatically out of context which for me made it all the more amusing. I preferred Vince doing Luger's entrance, I assume to show him what he wanted Lex to do, not just for fun....
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Post by Disaster Report on Mar 16, 2011 18:41:03 GMT -5
I just sat through this, kinda didn't like it. What do you need to know about WMV? Well, it was at Trump Plaza. That's it. What did they devote to that, 30 seconds total? Just seemed like it glossed over all of the details aside from locations and sometimes the attendance.
Also, this is the first time I've heard "Hulk says he wants to leave the company unless he main events WM7 with Sarge." What the hell?
"Ric didn't mesh well with the boys in the back." So you gave him two title runs in 18 months?
Enjoyed the WM9 footage though, more stuff like that and less back-patting would've been great.
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Post by Threadkiller [Classic] on Mar 16, 2011 18:50:07 GMT -5
Anyone who didn't expect a bunch of self-congratulatory segments was probably going to be disappointed by this doc.
But I think this is one of their best documentaries in ages, and for a topic as over-discussed as WM, I was surprised I continually found myself interested in what they were talking about.
I actually liked that they didn't go in chronological order, because the order they chose made just as much sense thematically, contrasting the different eras. Do WM 3, which had the indoor attendance record, and then skip ahead to the 20th anniversary of WM 3, which had the highest buyrate of any WM. Do WM 6, and then skip ahead to the next WM where they were in Canada, WM 18.
I really enjoyed the doc, back-patting be damned.
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Paco
Hank Scorpio
Posts: 7,145
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Post by Paco on Mar 16, 2011 19:40:58 GMT -5
I think one of the great moments was, in passing they say, "we don't know that one day we won't have WrestleMania on the Moon.". Yeah. That's probably not gonna happen. The logistics alone hurt my brain very badly. Welcome to the Space OlympicsWrestleMania...
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randomranter
Dennis Stamp
When you grow up....... YOU'RE GONNA BE WROOOOOONG!!!!
Posts: 4,804
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Post by randomranter on Mar 16, 2011 19:59:00 GMT -5
I just sat through this, kinda didn't like it. What do you need to know about WMV? Well, it was at Trump Plaza. That's it. What did they devote to that, 30 seconds total? Just seemed like it glossed over all of the details aside from locations and sometimes the attendance. To be fair, they had to or the documentary would go on all day. There are 26 wrestlemanias to talk about, and wrestlemania 5 isn't exactly one of the more memorable ones. More time was devoted to the ones that actually mattered. I'm thinking Sarge needs to stop being a mark for himself. I could be wrong here, but I think the real story is that they couldn't decide on a finish, so they went with the split main event. I guess they just didn't want to say that outright on the documentary. Granted, they did allude to matches being scripted at other times during the doc, but I guess they just didn't want to say it outright, so they came up with that as a cover story. That being said, I do remember them advertising Hogan/Flair at local house shows during that time. I never attended any of them, so I can't say what the reactions really were, but maybe there is some truth to the story that the reactions from the crowd weren't living up to expectations and the match wouldn't resonate with the overall audience as much as everybody thought it would. As others have said....this is Vince we're talking about. Taking an entire documentary as nothing more than a really long opportunity to pat himself on the back is pretty normal. With that being said, I was kinda surprised they didn't mention the Undertaker at all until the very end of the documentary, where they discussed the streak. If you take what's on the documentary at face value, it's interesting to note what the people that matter think of the Streak; Undertaker actually wants it broken if they find the right person for him to pass the torch to, but Vince, Cena, and HHH all want it to remain intact. And everybody seems to agree that the Streak has become a major selling point of Wrestlemania itself. This pretty much leads me to believe that the Streak will likely never be broken. If it is, they'll break it when they're 100% certain that it'll be Undertaker's last match.
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randomranter
Dennis Stamp
When you grow up....... YOU'RE GONNA BE WROOOOOONG!!!!
Posts: 4,804
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Post by randomranter on Mar 16, 2011 20:14:45 GMT -5
The thing that suprised me about the doc was WWE finally admitting to the low ticket sales for Wrestlemania 7. Well, not with words, but the body language of the guy giving the "official" story tells the truth. Along with the word "official story", now that I think of it. I think it was just an idea of "Decent idea, poor execution". The idea behind it was that Vince expected 100,000 people to pay to see Hogan get the victory over the evil iraqi sympathizer. Instead, they took the angle too far and ended up turning away the viewers they were expecting to attract. Once they realized that they weren't even going to come close to 100,000 (they had only sold 17k tickets....ouch) they had to abandon the idea. And the cover story may not be completely made up bullshit. I wouldn't be surprised if some nutjob(s) were really making death threats. would they be to the point where they had to move venues? I highly doubt it, but I wouldn't be surprised if there weren't at least some legitimate concerns at some level.
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Post by turkeysandwich on Mar 16, 2011 23:44:28 GMT -5
I just sat through this, kinda didn't like it. What do you need to know about WMV? Well, it was at Trump Plaza. That's it. What did they devote to that, 30 seconds total? Just seemed like it glossed over all of the details aside from locations and sometimes the attendance. Also, this is the first time I've heard "Hulk says he wants to leave the company unless he main events WM7 with Sarge." What the hell? "Ric didn't mesh well with the boys in the back." So you gave him two title runs in 18 months? Enjoyed the WM9 footage though, more stuff like that and less back-patting would've been great. Hogan leaving the company unless he main events with Sarge is very strange, although I wouldn't put it past Hogan saying that to Sarge, but there is no way that's factual. If Hogan was so keen on having Slaughter there, I imagine that they could have had him anytime that they wanted when Sarge was doing stuff like leading a team in the AWA's team challenge series. I was just disappointed that Jerry Brisco didn't say that "Mr. Mac-Mahon's idea for Wrestlemania knocked your socks off."
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Lardlad
El Dandy
Live reaction to @WWE #WWENetwork
Posts: 8,250
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Post by Lardlad on Mar 17, 2011 11:25:55 GMT -5
I haven't watched this yet, but I plan to tonight before Impact or on Friday right after SmackDown.
Having read most of the replies in this thread, I'm already pretty sure that I'm not going to enjoy this as much as I originally thought I would ... which is my own fault for setting my expectations WAY too high!
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CJ
Dennis Stamp
C.J. for Friendly wrestling discussion!
Posts: 4,180
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Post by CJ on Mar 17, 2011 12:04:54 GMT -5
Very underwhelming documentary I was expecting a helluva lot more
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Post by Wii M Punk on Mar 21, 2011 12:47:03 GMT -5
Watched the documentary last night (via means that didn't involve buying the DVD, let's just say) and thought it had it's good points and bad points.
Thought it started pretty well and was quite in-depth with stories of Wrestlemania 1, 2 and 3 but then from 4 onwards things began to feel a bit rushed plus I didn't like how they'd jump with things like Wrestlemania 6 was in Toronto so they talked about 18 next because it was also in Toronto. Same with Wrestlemania 3 and 23.
Was impressed with the sheer scale of the work they did on assembling the stage and setting for Wrestlemania 24. I didn't realise the history of the Citrus Bowl and how old and dated it looks, so to see the before and after shots was quite amazing.
Obviously, due to circumstances, there were so many things they couldn't talk about. Most notably Wrestlemania 20 and a certain closing shot from the event.
But there was so many matches on the undercards they ignored. The only time they seemed to put any effort into talking about a lower card match was Savage and Steamboat again at Wrestlemania 3 but like I say they went really in-depth with the first 3 events then rushed through the rest. Wrestlemania 4 and 5 being perfect examples of rushing.
When they spoke about Wrestlemania 7 they didn't bother acknowledging Savage vs Warrior which was a brilliant match.
The general concencus by those giving commentaries on the DVD said Wrestlemania 8 was a so-so event yet most wrestling fans love that show.
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